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396 recordsStructured records (JSON) ↗
Portrait of Dr. Frédérick Montizambert.
CA-K389Institutions

Dr. Frédérick Montizambert, Canada’s first public health chief

Dr. Frédérick Montizambert (1843–1929) was medical superintendent of the Grosse Île quarantine station for 30 years and later oversaw all of Canada’s quarantine stations, pioneering bacteriology and epidemiology. In 1899 he became Canada’s first Director General of Public Health, championing prevention, disinfection and vaccination during a time of mass immigration.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Lieutenant-General A. G. L. McNaughton in March 1942 (Department of National Defence).
CA-K387History

A. G. L. McNaughton, soldier and scientist

A. G. L. McNaughton (1887–1966), born in Moosomin in today’s Saskatchewan, played a notable role in Canadian life as a scientist, soldier, politician and diplomat. He served as an artillery officer in the First World War, co-invented the forerunner of radar, led the National Research Council, and represented Canada in senior diplomatic roles after the Second World War.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Alexander Morris in Ottawa, December 1869 (Topley Studio).
CA-K386Indigenous peoples & reconciliation

Alexander Morris and the Numbered Treaties

Alexander Morris, a supporter of Confederation and lieutenant-governor of Manitoba and the North-West Territories, negotiated Treaties 3, 4, 5 and 6 with First Nations from 1873 to 1876. First Nations sought a reciprocal relationship that safeguarded their autonomy, while Canada’s main goal was territorial expansion for settlers; Morris pressed the government to keep its spoken promises.

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Photo: William James Topley · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Father Albert Lacombe, photographed before 1916.
CA-K385Indigenous peoples & reconciliation

Father Albert Lacombe, missionary in the West

From 1852, Oblate priest Albert Lacombe spent over 60 years seeking to convert Indigenous Peoples in western Canada to Christianity, founding missions such as St. Albert with Métis and Cree help and acting as a go-between during Treaty 8 talks. He was the first principal of the High River Industrial School in 1884–1885 and advocated separating children from their families and suppressing Indigenous languages.

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Photo: Unknown author · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
A. M. Klein in the mid-1940s (Library and Archives Canada).
CA-K383Culture & sport

A. M. Klein, poet of Jewish Montréal

A. M. Klein (1909–1972) combined modernism with Jewish literary traditions in poetry that portrayed his downtown Montréal neighbourhood. His collection The Rocking Chair and Other Poems, depicting Quebec and its people, won the Governor General’s Award in 1949.

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Photo: Library and Archives Canada · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Massey Hall in downtown Toronto, photographed in 2017.
CA-K317Culture & sport

Massey Hall, Toronto’s concert hall since 1894

Massey Hall, a red-brick concert hall in downtown Toronto that opened in 1894, was a gift to the city from industrialist Hart Massey. Toronto’s major concert hall for much of the 20th century, it is one of Canada’s most important cultural institutions and renowned for its outstanding acoustics.

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Photo: Arild Vågen · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Credit & context
Dredge No. 4 in the Klondike, Yukon, which carries his commemorative plaque, photographed in 2012.
CA-K290Economy & trade

“Klondike Joe” Boyle and large-scale gold mining

Joseph Whiteside “Klondike Joe” Boyle (1867–1923) arrived in Dawson in 1897 and soon saw the potential of large-scale mining, returning in 1909 to head one of the Klondike’s largest mining operations. Known as “The King of the Klondike,” he left in 1916 to aid the Allied war effort and was decorated by several European nations for his work in Russia and Romania.

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Photo: Anthony DeLorenzo from Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 2.0 · Credit & context
Mabel Hubbard Bell, about 1917 (Harris & Ewing, Library of Congress).
CA-K289History

Mabel Hubbard Bell, organizer and philanthropist

Mabel Hubbard Bell (1857–1923), deaf since childhood, married Alexander Graham Bell in 1877 and gave crucial support to his research, including at their Beinn Bhreagh estate in Cape Breton. In Baddeck she helped establish the Young Ladies’ Club in 1891, the first Montessori classes and the earliest home and school association in Canada.

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Photo: Harris & Ewing · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
A portrait of Henry Youle Hind, about 1865.
CA-K288Places & geography

Henry Youle Hind’s surveys of the North-West

Henry Youle Hind (1823–1908), a scientist and explorer, led surveys of the North-West between 1857 and 1860 that produced scientific reports, photographs and maps. His reports on arable land helped shape Canada’s decision to pursue the acquisition of Rupert’s Land, a decision taken, as Parks Canada notes, without regard for Indigenous peoples.

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Photo: Cox, A. W. · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Credit & context
The Hydrostone district in Halifax, Nova Scotia, photographed in 2011.
CA-K287Institutions

Thomas Adams and the Hydrostone

Thomas Adams (1871–1940), a leading town planner in early-20th-century Canada, influenced provincial planning laws in seven provinces and led the early professionalization of planning. He designed public housing projects such as Lindenlea in Ottawa and the Hydrostone district of Halifax, planned to rebuild the Richmond neighbourhood after the 1917 Halifax Explosion.

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Photo: Paul from Hacketts Cove, Canada · Photo licence: CC BY 2.0 · Credit & context
Bowring Park in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, at sunset in 2011.
CA-K286Culture & sport

Frederick Todd, Canada’s first professional landscape architect

Frederick Gage Todd (1876–1948), Canada’s first professional landscape architect, trained with the Olmsted firm and designed beloved parks including Assiniboine Park in Winnipeg, Bowring Park in St. John’s and the Plains of Abraham battlefields park in Québec City. His 1903 plan for Ottawa influenced every later plan for the capital.

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Photo: Sivaprasad.ucc · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 3.0 · Credit & context
A portrait of George Brown, Father of Confederation.
CA-K277History

George Brown, The Globe and the Great Coalition

George Brown (1818–1880) founded the influential newspaper The Globe in 1844 and became a leading reformer and head of the “Clear Grit” party. In 1864 he was a key figure in the Great Coalition that made Confederation possible, and he co-founded the Anti-Slavery Society of Canada.

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Photo: Hunter & Co. · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
A portrait of Sir Adams George Archibald.
CA-K275Indigenous peoples & reconciliation

Adams Archibald, Métis land rights and Treaties 1 and 2

Adams George Archibald (1814–1892), first lieutenant-governor of Manitoba and the North-West Territories (1870–1872), was charged with administering the Manitoba Act’s guarantee of Métis land rights, which proved difficult amid settler encroachment and while Canadian militia subjected Métis people to a “reign of terror.” In 1871 he represented the Crown in negotiating Treaties 1 and 2, but several promises he made were not written into the treaties.

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Photo: User Magnus Manske on en.wikipedia · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
The Adelaide Hunter Hoodless Homestead in St. George, Ontario, photographed in 2014.
CA-K273History

Adelaide Hunter Hoodless, educator and reformer

Adelaide Hunter Hoodless (1857–1910), an educator and social reformer, promoted domestic economy as a school subject and helped establish household science institutes at Guelph, Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue and Toronto. She supported women’s organizations including the National Council of Women and the Federated Women’s Institutes, and helped establish the Victorian Order of Nurses.

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Photo: Paranoidpurist · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 3.0 · Credit & context
The Roger-Gaudry pavilion of the Université de Montréal, designed by Ernest Cormier, photographed in 2015.
CA-K267Culture & sport

Ernest Cormier, architect and engineer

Ernest Cormier (1885–1980), born in Montréal and trained at the École des Beaux-Arts de Paris, was an engineer and one of the most renowned Canadian architects of the 20th century, known for innovative design, new materials and attention to every detail. The federal government chose him to represent Canada in designing the United Nations Headquarters in New York (1949–1952).

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Photo: Laurent Bélanger · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Credit & context
Ernest Thompson Seton (Bain News Service photograph).
CA-K266Culture & sport

Ernest Thompson Seton, naturalist and writer

Ernest Thompson Seton (1860–1946), largely self-taught, made major contributions as a naturalist, ornithologist, conservationist and wildlife artist, and his bestselling realistic animal stories developed a distinctive Canadian genre. His “Woodcraft Indians” youth program influenced the Boy Scout movement and summer camps but, as Parks Canada’s 2022 review notes, also contributed to inaccurate stereotypes of First Nations.

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Photo: Bain News Service · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
A portrait of Sara Jeannette Duncan, taken no later than 1903.
CA-K265Culture & sport

Sara Jeannette Duncan and The Imperialist

Sara Jeannette Duncan (1861–1922), a pioneering late-19th-century journalist, challenged norms by examining women’s changing roles, the need for a national culture and Canadian politics. After leaving Canada in 1890 she lived in India and England and wrote more than 20 popular books, including The Imperialist (1904), a Canadian classic set in a fictionalized Brantford.

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Photo: not stated · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
A portrait of Isabella Valancy Crawford, published around 1919.
CA-K264Culture & sport

Isabella Valancy Crawford, poet

Irish-born Isabella Valancy Crawford (1850–1887) came to Canada as a girl, settled in Peterborough and supported her family by writing after 1875. Largely unknown in her short life, she is now considered one of the finest Canadian poets of her generation, best remembered for the long poems “Malcolm’s Katie” and “Old Spookses’ Pass.”

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Photo: Caswell, Edward S. (Edward Samuel), 1861-1938 · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
A portrait of Kathleen Blake Coleman, 1896.
CA-K263Culture & sport

Kit Coleman, pioneering journalist

Kathleen Blake Coleman (1856–1915), writing as “Kit,” ran the “Woman’s Kingdom” pages of Toronto’s Daily Mail, later the Mail and Empire, from 1889 to 1911, winning a wide following with her witty, irreverent style. As the first American-accredited woman war correspondent, she covered the Spanish-American War in Cuba in 1898.

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Photo: Photographer unidentified · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
The cathedral and statue of Curé Labelle in Saint-Jérôme, Quebec, photographed in 2007.
CA-K262History

Curé Labelle, the “King of the North”

To curb French-Canadian emigration to the United States, Curé Antoine Labelle (1833–1891), parish priest of Saint-Jérôme, encouraged settlement in northwestern Quebec, northern Ontario and Manitoba. He played a key role in settling the Laurentians and developing their railways, served as Quebec’s deputy minister of agriculture and colonization, and is remembered as the “roi du Nord.”

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Photo: Yvan leduc · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 3.0 · Credit & context
Chéticamp, Nova Scotia, seen from the water in 2009.
CA-K260History

Jeanne Dugas, Acadian co-founder of Chéticamp

Jeanne Dugas (1731–1817) and her family fled Île Royale (Cape Breton) to escape the 1758 deportation but were captured and imprisoned in Halifax. A midwife and keeper of Acadian stories, she co-founded Chéticamp around 1785; having lived through eight dislocations, she embodies the resilience of Acadian women through 50 years of upheaval.

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Photo: Michael Sprague from Candler, North Carolina · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 2.0 · Credit & context
The Manoir-Papineau in Montebello, Quebec, photographed in 2018.
CA-K258History

Louis-Joseph Papineau, leader of the Patriotes

Louis-Joseph Papineau (1786–1871) strove to reform Lower Canada’s political institutions and strengthen democracy. As Speaker of the House of Assembly and leader of the Parti canadien, later the Parti patriote, he became the leading political figure of the 1837–1838 uprisings; in 1850 he settled at his manor in Montebello.

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Photo: Marc-Lautenbacher · Photo licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Credit & context
A portrait of boxer Larry Gains, 1932 (Agence Rol).
CA-K253Culture & sport

Larry Gains, heavyweight champion

Larry Gains (1900–1983), a Black boxer born and trained in Toronto’s Cabbagetown, was one of the world’s best heavyweights in the 1920s and 1930s, winning the Canadian and British Empire heavyweight titles. Racism limited his chances in North America and barred him from a world heavyweight title fight despite wins over future champions.

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Photo: Agence Rol. Agence photographique (commanditaire) · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context
Honoré Beaugrand as mayor of Montréal, 1887, photographed by Wm. Notman & Son.
CA-K252Language & names

Honoré Beaugrand, La Patrie and La Chasse-galerie

Honoré Beaugrand (1848–1906), a free thinker who vigorously defended freedom of thought, headed French-language newspapers in the United States and Canada and founded La Patrie (1879–1978) in Montréal. As an author and publisher, he produced some of the earliest works of Franco-American literature, including La Chasse-galerie: Légendes canadiennes.

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Photo: Wm. Notman & Son · Photo licence: Public domain · Credit & context